if the fitness of things be not observed; we, the shrewd critics, who
pillory the luckless painter who dresses a gentleman of the
Restoration in the ruff of James First's court, gaze calmly on the
most ridiculous anachronisms and impossibilities, and smite our
perfumed gloves in approbation. It is no excuse to say that the whole
thing is absurd; that people do not carry on the business of life in
song, nor expire in recitative. That is true, but even fairy tales
have their consistency. Every part is adapted to every other, and, in
the key, the whole is harmonious. Hermann, for instance, the basso,
who sang Mephistopheles, would have been quite perfect if he had only
remembered this. But he forgot that Mephisto is a sly and subtle
devil. He caricatured him. He made him a buffoon and repulsive. Such
extravagance could not have imposed upon Faust or Martha; yet we all
agreed that it was very fine, and amiably applauded what no opera-goer
of sense could seriously approve.

You think that this is taking syllabub seriously, and that the
circumstances of the time had made the Easy Chair hypercritical. No;
it was only that there comes a time in theatre-going when the boxes
are more interesting than the stage. The mimic life fades before the
real. In the midst of the finest phrases of the impassioned Herr
Faust, what if your truant eyes stray across the parquette and see a
slight, pale figure, and recognize one of the bravest and most daring
Union generals, whose dashing assaults upon the enemy's works carried
dismay and victory day after day? Herr Faust trills on, but you see
the sombre field and the desperate battle and the glorious cause.
Gretchen musically sighs, but you see the brave boys lying where they
fell: you hear the deep, sullen roar of the cannonade; you catch far
away through the tumult of war the fierce shout of victory. And there
sits the slight, pale figure with eyes languidly fixed upon the stage;